Archive for Week 7 Discussions

Since my mind is still focused a lot on the 2012 elections, I’m going to think of advertising in the political sense. One pro of advertising is that you can get your message out as a candidate (or Super PAC or other individual body) to a large audience. You can spin many things many different ways, good or bad, and it actually can sway public opinion about you or your opponent. Publicity is huge in today’s society, and if your name isn’t out there in some way, shape, or form, you’re definitely not going to have good odds at winning your election.

Cons of advertising are that it can get very….messy. Mud-slinging is a good example. We’ve been barraged with constant political ads up until eleciton day, and the vast majority are negative. The general public always gets annoyed and fed up with all these ads, and it can discourage voters and even put a negative overall spin on a candidate (see Mitt Romney’s ad about Jeep expanding into China).

Overall, advertising is generally not the best way to be informed as a citizen, and it can get annoying with constantly seeing political ads. For candidates, it is completely necessary, however, to put out these ads, positive and negative, in order to win. It can sometimes come back to bite them, though.

I think that advertising can be a good thing or an awful thing, but it depends on the situation. For the recent presidential campaign, advertising can help inform the public on their views and show the truth. It isn’t all good advertising though. Sometimes these advertisements stretch the truth and just try to negatively effect the other candidate. Advertisements can be a mix of lies and the truth and I think that is what is so bad about them. You can’t tell what is the truth. There is advertising for donations to help find a cure for various illnesses, or supporting our troops. These advertisements provide information to people while promoting a good cause.

Basically, advertisements can be bad when they are influencing peoples decisions based on lies. They can also be good, when they are providing helpful information, promoting a cause, or selling a product.

I really like the ads for e*trade. They have a baby with the voice of a man that talks about e*trade and all the cool things it can do. The commercials are funny so I like to watch them. I think humor is something that is helpful in advertising because people always like a good laugh.

What are pros and cons of advertising? For examples, think about visual communication from an ad you really liked and one ad you really disliked. Explain why you were inspired or repelled by the ads – how much of your feelings were affected by the words, or by the images.

By Katherine Woods

Like anything in the world there are both pros and cons to every aspect of life. In advertising I personally believe that this particular line tends to be blurred. I personally believe that the only positive advertising out there, is advertising that is promoting good or promoting a non-profit organizations. I love advertising for breast cancer awareness, or going green initiatives. This type of advertising is trying to make a positive impact and helps other people. It creates conversations between people and helps raise awareness to certain problems and how easy it is to help out.

At the same time there are all kinds of advertising that are doing more harm than good. I particularly dislike advertising for easy to take pills or quick acting formulas promising fast weight loss. In just a few sentences or pictures they promise to give you the look you’ve always wanted, this goes right along with almost all fashion advertising depicting super skinny women. This type of advertising can lead to quick acting eating disorder which is not at all as pretty as the advertising shows. I do like advertising when it gives a good message to the public and is not skewed or deceptive.

Related to the PR debates: What are pros and cons of advertising? For examples, think about visual communication from an ad you really liked and one ad you really disliked. Explain why you were inspired or repelled by the ads – how much of your feelings were affected by the words, or by the images.

Some of the cons of advertising, I feel, is more about the audiences certain advertisements trigger. Nowadays, you’ll find a lot of alcoholic ads, seductive ads, things of that sort… everywhere. Billboards, signs, TV, magazines. Granted they keep adults magazines separate from kids magazines, but in stores… they’re all in the same aisle where kids, too, go. They’ll see the front of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition. I just feel some ads, younger kids and even teens should not be exposed to, but it’s hard to control who is really going to lay eyes on it. This also goes with visual communication from ads that I disliked. Take alcohol ads for example, they show fun and happy beautiful people having fun and drinking, that’s how you enjoy life. They don’t show how sometimes it breaks apart families and takes lives in certain situations, sometimes both in the same story. This is from personal experience, also, I feel this way.

Some of the pros of advertising, I see, as the health and fitness ads. I like seeing ads for weight watchers, workouts, gyms and such. They want to better the health of people and their fitness. They use real people who made real successes for motivation and I feel because of medical and health reasons, there really aren’t a lot of ways to lie to make their products or programs “look better.” When I see the success pictures or stories, they really make me feel like I would like to better myself in that way. They’re positive, these are the pros and the ads I really like.